Tropical Look Suffering From Fatal Cold

April 6, 1985|By Susanne Hupp of The Sentinel Staff

You may think you have problems with the freeze-dried bottle brush or queen palm tree in your yard, but consider the plight of the horticulturists in charge of landscaping Central Florida's huge tourist attractions.

They had barely cleaned up the brown debris from the cold spell of 1983 when the January 1984 round of bitter temperatures clobbered their tender tropical trees and shrubs one more time.

As a result, Walt Disney World, Sea World, Cypress Gardens and the Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress Resort horticulturists have concluded that some of these tropical species are not worth the effort and are replacing freeze-prone trees and shrubs with native varieties.

''We've learned our lesson,'' says Martin Schwertoffer, director of landscaping at Sea World, ''we try to get a tropical look but when you get a temperature drop like we have had the past two winters, it's just not worth it.''

Although the Sea World landscape will look less like the tropical Florida tourists expect to find, the company will be replacing tropical silk oaks, melaleuca and bottle brush trees that were hurt last year, then finished off by this year's freeze with native cypress pine and oaks.

''It's going to look like up north, Schwerhoffer says, ''but we can't afford to do this every year.''

Sea World will replace $35,000 worth of trees and plants this year, and they'll spend another $15,000 for labor. They cut last year's $90,000 loss by switching to more cold-tolerant plants.

At Cypress Gardens, where the temperature dropped to 20 degrees for seven hours on Jan. 21, tropical plantings in the outlying areas will also have to go, says Norman Freel, vice president in charge of horticulture at the attraction. Cypress Gardens did not lose many of its thousands of azalea bushes and bougainvillea vines in the main gardens because 54 of the 100-plus acres can be kept warm by propane gas heaters fed by underground gas lines.

''We've decided, 'If you can't keep it warm you don't need it,' '' Freel says, adding that most of the tender trees and shrubs in outlying areas had already been taken out last year, and the rest will be replaced this year with varieties indigenous to Central Florida.

Walt Disney World's chief horticulturist, Katie Warner, is also planning major changes. Her crews will replace tropical trees in parking lots and along roadways with native magnolia, oak, pine and cypress.

''Some of our plants really were not able to withstand another freeze. We had major damage last year to the eucalyptus and took some trees down, cut others back. This year we had further damage and we'll be removing them.''

Disney's most distressed areas were the tropical areas of the Magic Kingdom, the Jungle Cruise in Adventureland, Discovery Island and, at Epcot Center, the Mexican Pavilion.

In these areas Disney will stick with tropical plants in the hardier varieties, Warner says, because she does not expect that the extreme temperatures of the past two winters to continue.

''Weather doesn't change dramatically permanently; we're not anticipating that we're going to have the lows we have for the past two years,'' she says. The dozens of queen palms that dot the property at the Hyatt Regency Grand Cypress will be chucked and such species as sabal and Canary Island date, livistonia and Washingtonia palms put in their places, says Tom Hicks, director of landscaping.

Hicks, Chip Drew, horticulturist for the resort, and the owners of the Grand Cypress decided to get rid of the fragile queen palms after they'd been ''zapped two years in a row and a lot of trees hadn't really recovered,'' Hicks says. At least 30 had been removed last year, and the rest will be replaced this year, he says.

When the freeze hit, all of the attractions had installed their winter annuals -- pansies, snapdragons, stock and petunias, elysium. Some of these, notably the pansies, survived and were back in bloom a couple of days after the freeze. Next year, Sea World will plant only pansies in flower beds, Schwerthoffer says.

Schwerthoffer believes that some of the measures his staff took, such as fertilizing in September rather than October, helped prepare plants for a possible freeze and prevented more extensive damage.